Danny Phantom & The Ghost Game
by papercutprincess
Summary: School's back in session after a little ghost rendezvous in Amity. Danny sincerely misses naptime and will miss something else by second period, his memory perhaps? What if Val knew about Danny but not vice versa? And what's what's with this new game? DxV
1. Chapter 1

1

"Casper High is back in action …"

"… And doling out specters of epic proportions and trail mix variety …" contributed Sam Mason as she fished her Chemistry I book out of her locker. The lockers were discernibly alloy mutts of the lowest quality. His was filled to the brim with half-done school projects and distinctively reeked of M&Ms. But only the brown ones. Hers was filled with medieval knick-knacks, lipstick metal bands, and happy bunny stickers. Sam took the liberty of closing both their lockers with a satisfying click. The fluorescent lights gleamed off the tofu metal because his locker closed at a gleam-attractive slant … she glanced at his profile, it had been a while.

She smirked and sneered at the same time, portraying her Gothic mentality with a cornucopia of dark clothing and an attitude to match.

" … And I really needed the extra time to crash." Danny Fenton leaned against the cool metal and butchered his posture as he continued to grin-and-bare-it. "All the endless ghost fighting won't commit to curfew and nap time has suffered."

Tucker Foley sauntered toward them while classmates continued to roam the hall at ends with the delayed early bell. There was a wide range of attitudes toward the return to academics the new mayor was establishing. "Hey guys, how's been?"

"The mayor cut funding on tofu burgers, I'm starting a protest." Stated Sam.

"Some things never change … you're the same as always Sam, and you look … tired, Danny." Tucker thumb-wrestled his PDA like it promised to give him all the answers, and he would get seriously bent if it didn't.

"You don't look like you've changed much either." Danny muttered, "Sorry, I'm so tired I could pick a fight with an inanimate object right now."

A peer in a clique near the water fountain cried, "Ghost!"

Danny jumped and situated his unequipped hand to blast ethereal confrontation into any texture of spectroplasm. "Their talking about the new video game, Danny, stay chill." Tucker intervened.

"About the ghost situation …"

"What?!" Danny carried out the same maneuver.

"Danny!" Tucker and Sam cried in unison.

Danny regained his composure. "Uh, yes Vice Principle Lancer?"

Lancer regarded Danny with caution and then continued.: "About the ghost situation, is that the new shizzle," somehow Vice Principle Lancer always lapsed back to dated slang like a bad drug addiction. "I would like to know how long it will be dope and randy because some of your fellow classmates have chosen to take out their youthful vigor on my African violets." He held a pot of wilted purple clumps in his hands.

"I couldn't tell you, you might want to take it up with the populars though. They probably set an expiration date and a surrogate trend already."

"Probably right, have an educational and crunk day, homie Gs."

As Lancer tracked down his next victim Sam commented, "Good one Danny, you almost blasted Lancer's flowerpot with your imaginary lasers."

"Vice Principle Lancer should really look toward the populars for insights on petty trends like 'Ghost'." Tucker suggested to no one in particular.

"Twits like Paulina and Valerie Gray know all about, wait --isn't tech your area of expertise Tucker?"

"That's true, but 'Ghost' isn't true tech." Tuck stated. "It's just a cheap imitation of a video game some nowhere company made a decade ago."


	2. Chapter 2

2

The stench of Bio II was beckoning with a rancid trail of yellow fluid, most likely kermit and Ms. Piggy's offspring. Danny swayed and choked unremittingly persecuted by dissections in all directions. In the interval between the third and fourth gag he let out a small blue breath, a silent alarm, like the scalpel in his hand, dropped precariously near Sam's fitted mesh gloves. Almost simultaneously the prisoners of science flew to the door and jumped at the chance to omit class and make studio audience noises at Mr. Grimndell. Or more particularly Mr. Grimndell's supercomputer, really a glorified palm pilot, while it whipped down hallway B.

Really with the advance in technology, this really wouldn't be awe worthy except for the tiny fact that Mr. G was being strangled by a lively charger. Conflicted by his devotion to electronic devices, his disputing was lacking and so were his lungs.

Danny ducked behind Ms. Jane's desk and made a staid promise: "I'm going ghost."

Instantaneously in a fit of light an ordinary teenager transformed into hybrid ghost warrior Danny Phantom.

Danny forced open the window that should have been open anyways and took a nose dive for the dumpster before pulling up like a fighter jet and flipping it onto the roof before sticking it in neutral. "Technus …"

"And I've finally got something to win the war, Danny Phantom." He rose as the electronic beast he was. He even had a gleam about him, except this time it was probably the glare from the sun. "Oh yeah, it's a real winner. In fact, it's guaranteed to shock you!"

Subsequently another uninvited guest showed up looking a serious threat, the red fighter was back in action after a _long _break. "Oh man, Valerie …" Danny's face twinges as it recalled how she never failed to give it an definite trial period of anything hard, sharp, and/or life-threatening. "Look Technus, as much of a joke as you are I'd rather just get to the punch line." _There's no way I can avoid a fight here … _He burst into action and attempted to take a swing at Technus's face … But Technus seemed as vulnerable as a hologram as he phased through Danny's fingers. "Whoa, this is a new development."

Technus entangled Danny with a conglomeration of plasmid light and electric chords. Danny couldn't so much as hoard a breath before it was on him. And it just kept coming. Danny sifted through the ground at a disadvantage. He wavered like light before sifting back onto the war zone. "That's pretty nasty stuff there."

"So is the noise you're parents will make when they find out their little boy has been transformed into a puddle of ectoplasmic goo. Not that you were ever _not _a mistake Danny Phantom." Danny charged his everything from sophisticated to a head butt to no avail. He seemed to have the upper hand, Technus seemed to be the one in charge. "A half ghost and a half-a human, half Danny Phantom …" Danny's green eyes widened and he skidded to a stop on a path of air "… and half Danny Fenton."

Impulse got him to look over his shoulder at Valerie … an expression of complete and total shock … it looked as if he'd only be fighting one adversary today but he'd be loosing twice. He sunk a little … "Valerie …"

"I'm your opponent, Phantom." And with a deafening blast Danny Phantom was laid out and a steaming from the friction.

Danny lapsed in and out of consciousness trying to steel himself. He tossed his head over to where Valerie was frozen and the remainder of fight just _left _him. To make matters worse, there were people pounding at the roof access, either the number of janitors in Casper High had multiplied or the whole student body had come up for air.

_And now Valerie's going to finish me off …_

Technus said more stuff, verbal abuse to fall his heart further. Danny didn't hear it. Danny closed his eyes.

Several stunted lifetimes died before he opens them again.

He was cued off surreally by a warm hand on his chest and a bright pink blast shooting _away_ from him. Technus was poof and Valerie was close, close enough to block out the pink residue and this second black oblivion. "Danny …"

_Oh no, is she hurt too?_ And of course somehow she was. She reduced to his height and clattered to the asphalt. _It's the red fighter, why is it that I can only see Valerie inside that heap of ghost murder. _"Aren't you going to kill me too?"

"You'd think that why?" She asked flatly, her thick brown hair splaying over his chest.

"Because," he chose a sweet mockery to overwhelm the sound effects his heart was making. "If there ever was a ghost laxative … and it was a bipedal, bias ghost hunting girl … it would probably have you somewhere on the label." He said while distributing the pain mentally, his eyes were dimming to a dusty blue.

She chuckled softly.

"Am I funny?" She softened and her loud thoughts retreated into her mind as her head sunk into his chest. Warm cheek against torn latex. "You said my name. Twice."

"The first time was to myself. You know?"

She smiled idly, her head full of pretty thoughts that kept the bearing of the act she was about to commit from registering. The act that made an angry tear slide down her cheek. "Can't have people knowing my name." A desperate voice screamed in the back of her head but all her thoughts were so quiet now … She lifted the heavy artillery like a cumbersome cradle and Danny instinctively went for it thinking she'd pull the trigger, it wasn't really daunting when she turned it on him.

"We're too close, it's go off on both of us."

"Sorry Danny …"


	3. Chapter 3

3

He backed her locker as he relished in the silence of adjourned interrogation. _Sam, you keep asking me what happened and I don't have any substantial answers for that. Sam, I feel lighter … knowing the answers has always made me feel so heavy. Not answers like 100 kilobytes in a gigabyte, conclusion that I came up with by myself. You never understood that._

Valerie wandered down the hall in a similar or dissimilar rather, daze. "Hey Valerie …" Danny beckoned. She turned around expectantly, the hallway emptied into the auditorium, Tucker and Sam were there too. "Valerie … Hey …" He smiled and relished in this. It wasn't quite so awkward anymore.

"Hey Danny, how's the shoulder?"

"I _wish _I couldn't feel it." He tilted his head. "How about those ribs and your neck?"

"I was singing and dancing when the finally let me out of the ER."

Danny grinned. "So I was thinking … I don't know but I know … I like … Chinese food. And I was wondering," he laughed at himself, "if you like Chinese food …"

"Uh huh." She tried to fight a smile in vain.

"… And if you'd like to get some with me."

"I like Chinese food. Geisha's Apprentice uh … 7:30?"

"Yes …" he clapped his bruised hands together. _Ow. Wow, Mr. Chin will think it's hospital convention … _"Sounds good."

"Uh _huh_." She patted his chest and continued down the hallway.

Sam was furious and more than just a little confused, _was this fair??_ She glanced sideways into the depths of her locker where the ring he'd gave her hung like a silent promise. _Man I _hate _pop culture but … I've seen Boy Meets World. We've been best friends forever, why can't we just --_

"Danny?" Tucker began, a little irked.

_That's right Tucker, give him a piece of your mind._

"We were supposed to do that History thing tonight."

Danny gave his friend his full attention as he pulled off a bashful smile. "Me and Valerie won't be too long. Wait for me at my house and I'll be there around by nine."

Tucker tapped the adjacent locker with his PDA, you could tell from the haze in green eyes he was distracted. "Alright, cool." Then he smiled and added the kind of unnecessary joke he was infamous for. "But if she tries to kill you, don't pay for dinner."

Danny smiled, "Why would she try and kill me?"

Paullina appeared like a ghost in front of them, but a ghost probably didn't wear pink flip flops and $100 dollars worth of make-up. It was worth it though, she did look gorgeous. "Hurray up, losers. The pep rally is starting." And she gave them a complimentary hair lip were the bad lighting did for her hair what a good wax does for a car. Yes, Paullina was exceptionally beautiful but Danny found himself not unaffected. Maybe perpetual drool was a phase, more likely he was over her.

"I'm completely above it all ..."


End file.
